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The first settlers in Massachusetts were the Pilgrims who established Plymouth Colony in 1620 and developed friendly relations with the Wampanoag people. [6] This was the second permanent English colony in America following Jamestown Colony.
Puritans began to immigrate from England in large numbers, and they established the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1629 with 400 settlers. They sought to reform the Church of England by creating a new, pure church in the New World. By 1640, 20,000 had arrived, although many died soon after arrival.
The Massachusetts Bay Colony had been founded by the owners of the Massachusetts Bay Company, which included investors in the failed Dorchester Company which had established a short-lived settlement on Cape Ann in 1623. The colony began in 1628 and was the company's second attempt at colonization.
New England colonial leaders sought a way allowing the individual colonies to coordinate a collective defense of New England. The New England leaders also felt that they were unique among the American colonies, and they hoped to band together to preserve their Puritan values. The treaty calls on the New England colonies to act as a nation ...
They first decided to base the colony at Charlestown, but a lack of good water there prompted them to move to the Shawmut Peninsula where they founded what is now the city of Boston. [61] The season was relatively late, and the colonists decided to establish dispersed settlements along the coast and the banks of the Charles River in order to ...
Plymouth Colony did not have a royal charter authorizing it to form a government, yet some means of governance was needed. The Mayflower Compact was the colony's first governing document, signed by the 41 Puritan men aboard the Mayflower upon their arrival in Provincetown Harbor on November 21, 1620. Formal laws were not codified until 1636.
However, the colony ignored the English demands to cease operations until at least 1682, when Hull's contract as mintmaster expired, and the colony did not move to renew his contract or appoint a new mintmaster. [153] The coinage was a contributing factor to the revocation of the Massachusetts Bay Colony charter in 1684. [154]
In 1620, they established the Plymouth Colony, in which they erected Congregational churches. [1] The Puritans' later establishment of the Massachusetts Bay colony eventually became more powerful in the area; but the Pilgrims' story nevertheless became a central theme in the history and culture of the United States. [2]